Short Stories & Tall Tales by James J. Griffin
While a native New Englander, Jim has been a student of the frontier West from a very young age. He has traveled extensively throughout the western United States, and has visited many of the famous Western frontier towns, such as Tombstone, Pecos, Deadwood, Cheyenne, and numerous others.
Jim became particularly interested in the Texas Rangers from the television series Tales of the Texas Rangers. His deep interest in the Texas Rangers led him to amass an extensive collection of Texas Ranger artifacts, which is now in the permanent collections of the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum in Waco.
Jim has also been an avid horseman all of his life. He bought his first horse, a pinto, while he was a junior in college, and has owned several American Paint Horses, including his current mount, Yankee.
Jim's books are traditional Westerns in the best sense of the term, with strong heroes who have good moral values. Highly reminiscent of the pulp westerns of yesterday, the heroes and villains are clearly separated with few shades of gray. No anti-heroes to be found here.
Jim is a graduate of Southern Connecticut State University. When not traveling out West, he currently divides his time between Branford, Connecticut and Keene, New Hampshire.
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Banker's Bluff
James J. Griffin
The sun was setting over the rugged, arid landscape of far west Texas. Young Texas Ranger Pete Natowich pulled his horse to a halt, not quite sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him. “Trooper, unless I’m seein’ things, that’s a lake just ahead, off to the left. Who’d ever have thought we’d find this much water around here? We’re gonna spend the night here, boy. Can’t make Rankin until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest anyway.”
Railroad Canyon
James J. Griffin
Lucy Squires Taggart gazed distastefully at her Texas Ranger husband while he dressed.
“Clay, please tell me you’re not going to wear that shirt,” she said.
“Why not? What’s wrong with this shirt?” Clay responded.
“It’s all faded and worn. The elbows are ready to wear through, and it’s been patched too much. And those old bloodstains. They’ll never wash out completely,” Lucy explained.
The Wind
James J. Griffin
I awoke with a scream loud enough to wake the dead. I began to leap from my bunk, butinstead settled back down, shaking with fear and covered with sweat. The full moon sent its vivid light through the bunkhouse window and directly onto my bed, while a steady wind moaned through the pines. That wind had blown open the door and slammed it against the wall.
The Youngest Ranger
James J. Griffin
Texas Ranger Clay Taggart reined his black and white overo to a halt atop a low hill. The view took in the settlement a short distance south. Taggart swung out of the saddle and pulled off his Stetson. He lifted his canteen from the saddlehorn, opened it, and poured most of the contents into the hat. He placed the hat in front of the horse’s muzzle. The gelding drank greedily.
Partners
Jim Griffin
"Looks like those hombres headed right into the canyon, T. That shoe with the piece chipped out of it shows plain enough," Texas Ranger Jack Blanchard told his buckskin paint gelding. Blanchard had dismounted and was carefully studying the hoofprints left by the horses of the men he'd been following for the past three days.
Blanchard glanced up at the lowering sun as he swung back into the saddle.
Gunfight at Taylor Ridge
James J. Griffin
After what seemed like weeks of dreary, rainy weather here in New England, Sunday dawned warm and sunny, so after attending 7:30 Mass I decided to take my horse Yankee out for some riding and patrol time. Yank and I are volunteers with the Connecticut Horse Council Volunteer Horse Patrol.Members of the patrol help park rangers and personnel from the Connecticut D.E.P. in assisting visitors to the state parks and forests.
Bullets, Blizzard, and the Babe
James J. Griffin
1. “Sam, looks like we might make it home for Christmas after all,” Texas Ranger Lieutenant Jim Blawcyzk remarked to his gelding, Sam. “That’s Jude Tobin’s horse, along with the boy’s who’s ridin’ with him. Looks like the information we were given back in town is correct; they are holed up in that shack.”
The Wolf
James J. Griffin
Tate Sims watched from a bluff high above as his target knelt alongside a small creek, then bent over the water, cupped his hands, and dipped them into the stream. Sims lifted his rifle to his shoulder, aimed carefully, and fired. His target arched in pain when Sims’ bullet ripped into his back, then collapsed face-down into the creek.
A Kidnapping in Alice
James J. Griffin
1. “We’ll be in Alice shortly, Jasper. Soon as I look up Dave Owens, I’ll get you settled in a stall for a couple of days,” Texas Ranger Joe Kaminski told his horse. “Reckon you could use some rest as much as I can, mebbe more. And this time, I’m finally gonna catch a bigger fish than Dave, bet a hat on it.”
Jasper merely snorted.
“Oh, you don’t think so, horse?” Joe said, with a chuckle. “Well, I’ll show you, smart guy. C’mon, get movin’.”
The Phantoms of Metototootsie
James J. Griffin
1. “We’ve been makin’ good time, Bob,” Thad “Spider” Webb said to his riding partner, Bob Taylor, as they and two other Box X cowboys, Mort Sullivan and Pete Hollings, rode along. The four men had been in the saddle for five days as they drove a small herd of eighty head of cattle south from the Box X home range, near Benson, Arizona, to Fort Huachuca, the Army post only fifteen miles from the Mexican border.
